


are you okay (if no, I'll be there in five)

by volunteer_of_hufflepuff



Series: looking through a shattered telescope at another universe [3]
Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Angst, BAMF Maia Roberts, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Maia is a Good Girlfriend, Post 3x10, Simon Lewis Needs Hugs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-12
Updated: 2018-07-12
Packaged: 2019-05-25 23:03:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,616
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14987501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/volunteer_of_hufflepuff/pseuds/volunteer_of_hufflepuff
Summary: Maia's at a motel in Boston, enjoying the anonymity, when she gets a phone call from her boyfriend.For all is not well.Looks like Maia's trekking back to Brooklyn tonight.





	are you okay (if no, I'll be there in five)

**Author's Note:**

> Just a short little drabble to celebrate the end of exams! Hope you like it x
> 
> 'Cause clearly, Maia's an amazing girlfriend...
> 
> It turned out to be longer than a drabble and that is why this is later than I expected. Hope you still enjoy x
> 
> As always, #SaveShadowhunters. Everyone has been doing great!

The motel is quiet. There are no whisperings of uprisings, of torturous exes, of incoming world doom lingering in the twisting streets of Boston.

Maia's been paying by the night, enjoying the buffet breakfast, and though she has garnered some stares for her scars, it is nowhere near the same scrutiny she faces in a world where everyone knows what she is and decides her position for her, heaping on stone after stone onto her until she can barely walk. But she has shattered stone before and come out stronger; yet, here, she doesn't have to constantly prove herself, constantly guard herself against danger lurking around every corner.

Yet there is always a hum, vibrant and somewhat dangerous, hiding beneath her skin. Maia can't remember what it is like to live without the claws of paranoia buried deep within her heart; her brother, Dylan, had been the perfect son under the blazing light of the sun but a monster with the rising of the moon, dying only for Maia to fall into Jordan, a trap that had been sickly and, eventually, deadly sweet. And then she was thrown to the Downworld where death was imminent as war haunted every day.

They'd had a day if that break from having to fight for their very right to exist. And yet so many of them had failed; Gretel, her throat slitten as a pawn in Valentine's war; Alaric, burnt out of belief in Luke's faith in Clary.

This was a break; a chance to indulge in browsing for clothes instead of ordering them online and hoping they didn't mind delivering to a Chinese restaurant in the middle of the river, yet it was also a gasp into the air that had been polluted, waiting to engulf her and everyone she loved.

It was in the evening that she watched the rain cascade down the glass that shielded her from an outside world which was less innocent than it seemed; she had spotted demons beforehand, before deciding it best not to interfere. Heavens knows she didn't want even more connections with shadowhunters then she already had, didn't want to paint an even larger target on her back.

Yet a few clouds were still sprinkled across the sky, and she still had her phone. She needed space, not panic.

The motel's bed sheets were always starched, so she stretched back onto the bed, staring listlessly at the ceiling. If only Jordan had kept his mouth shut, she wouldn't have felt like she was on the brink of suffocating.

Her phone sang, illuminating the room.

A goofy picture of Simon appeared and Maia immediately sat up, feeling like she had just sat an exam and had barely penned her last word before time ran out. Simon had agreed to not call unless it was urgent -and so far, he hadn't called.

It had been nearly a week if that. With dread starting to curl in her stomach, she swiped her finger across the screen, preparing for the worse, her barriers going back up along with her back.

"Hi," she said cautiously, prodding at the waters which were now raging with an unknown current, "how are you?"

"Maia." His voice betrayed any semblance of being okay that Simon was trying to uphold; stuffy, but not the sick kind, but that of crying yourself to sleep after been shot down by the world too many times in a row. "A lot's happened."

"Anything good?" She can't help the anxiety that slips through, needling its way into her voice, the concern sugarcoating it leaking out in buckets.

"Jace is no longer possessed," and there was a pause, and Maia braced herself for the inevitable barb, "because Magnus gave up his magic. And - and his immortality."

"Oh." From the day she had met Magnus, he had been all style and elegance, his magic like another, beautiful and fluent limb. "That's... not good."

"And, you know Heidi?" Simon let out a bitter, self-deprecating laugh. "That crazy vampire that I apparently sired? She found my family."

Her instinctive curiosity makes her want to ask how, but that's not what's needed in the here and now. "Are they okay?" Maia asked instead.

Simon's tone was brittle, yet it had also already snapped. "Rebecca - something happened, long story short, she knows now. But she's ok with it. But my mum -" and it _shatters_ , fragile as it is, into too many splinters to be picked up miles away.

"Simon," she said, not really interrupting as his increasingly heavy breaths weren't much to interrupt, "if it's really this bad, you can tell me in person. Look, it's seven now. There's a train to New York at eight, which will take about four hours. If you meet me at the station, I can meet you by midnight."

The plan, so concrete spiralling out of Maia's mouth, was really borne out of the paranoia of constantly checking the train schedule because their world was a simmering mess, prone to explode at any moment. And it had.

Simon's breathing has slowed, somewhat.

Maia tapped a pen against her knee. "Is that ok?"

Simon's breathing stuttered to a halt, almost. "Of course. Thanks - thanks, Maia. I'll see you in five."

It wasn't difficult for Maia to stuff her meagre belongings into her suitcase. The silence of the city seeped into the motel; the lobby was deserted save for a receptionist when Maia pulled her suitcase down the wooden stairs.

The receptionist blinked. "Excuse me, ma'am, but you cannot book out now. It's against protocol. See you in the morning." She had already turned back to typing away at a computer, its age betrayed by the monitor humming in cracked bursts.

It's 7:15. The next train won't be until the morning, and Maia doesn't know any warlocks here.

Maia didn't move. "It's a family emergency," she said, her voice firm, her gaze unwavering. "I don't care if it is against protocol. I have paid, and I am leaving."

Never before had she so casually called someone _family_. Parents shouldn't prefer one child over the other so much so that they don't even blink when the 'lesser' one is gone. Brothers shouldn't spear their sisters with wicked grins. Boyfriends shouldn't turn their girlfriends into werewolves, especially without their consent.

With Luke, she had thought... _maybe_. Maybe he cared for, maybe her new alpha would learn to care for Maia due to her own merits, not as yet another pack member. But then he had literally locked her away to chase his precious Clary, and those dreams had been decimated.  _I_ _thought you were different._

But Simon... he doesn't see love as finite. Or those who he loves as possessions; he sees them as treasures that light up his world. It had taken time for Maia to trust him, but years of oppression of deep, mutual and healthy bonds led to a rush of immediate  _oh, this is what home is supposed to feel like_  after Simon had found the key to her battered heart through actions, not words _._  

And she'd be damned if she let anyone get in her way of nurturing his light in return.

"Oh." The receptionist looked up, some semblance of intrigue joining the fatigue in her sunken eyes. "Is this... important?"

"I think someone just died," Maia snapped, agitation rolling up her back to pour venom into her eyes, "so no, it's not just an F on a test."

The receptionist finally twisted her hand onto the table, palm up, the wrinkles deep. "I'll have the key, then. Go!"

Her kindness is unsettling, to be honest. Maia had forgotten about the simple, small kindnesses of the world, having been starved of any for so long. "Thank - thank you."

The sun has already set by the time she's outside and the air is crisper than it was before, the stars gracing the sky with aching familiarity.

It's 7:30 when a guy who is quaking hands her the ticket. "The night train usually isn't popular."

"Well, good thing I'm not going to Brooklyn for the scenery, then." Maia wonders why she keeps on engaging with the mundanes who are simply cogs in her mission tonight. It's probably the comfort, the normality. Like she really was just going home because she felt like it, not because of the strain prevalent in her boyfriend's voice.

The train ride is almost eerily quiet. Maia keeps up a texting rapport with Simon; about Blade Runner, Star Wars, all the small mundane things they had both enjoyed before their lives had been irreversibly changed.

His grammar is perfect, and that is what worries Maia. Perfection implies caution, implies censoring. And if Simon of all people is crafting his words instead of throwing them all out... well, then her hypothesis is becoming even more bloated with evidence with the ticking clock.

She's so caught up by her burgeoning worry that she doesn't even notice when the train comes to a slow halt. Yet when she does look up, she sees Simon standing at the gate. Bloodshot eyes, ruffled hair and slumped shoulders. A slump not out of forgetfulness, but of weariness.

Her suitcase is forgotten. It doesn't go flying, but Maia does, wrapping her arms around Simon. Tremors fly out of Simon. Fast, unrelenting, shortly accompanied by tears which soak into Maia's new cashmere jumper. But she couldn't care less about her clothes.

"Hey," Maia said softly, rubbing his back, "whenever you are ready, Simon, I'm here for you." 

It was quiet but for Simon's stifled sobs when the clock rang out twelve, signifying a new day, and, perhaps, a time to stitch up wounds both fresh and old.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos are always appreciated x
> 
> if anyone is interested, my tumblr is [here](https://mirrorofliterature.tumblr.com/)!


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